It’s been an interesting few days.
First and foremost, I’d like to congratulate my best friend and lovely blogger Zal for getting published on WoW.com.
Now.
The issue of Cranky Healer, Too Many Annas, and SAN, is one that’s affected me quite a lot.
I am a sensitive soul, and an easily upset one. I am dedicated to my friends and my guild, and I’m loyal. I adore every person who ever commented on my blog, or who linked me in their blogroll. I read blogs avidly, absorbing information, loving writing style.
Now, to the issue in hand.
I’ve exchanged comments with Cranky Healer. I’ve read her blog, she’s read mine. I think she’s lovely. I think she’s probably quite like me – sensitive. I have never exchanged comments with Too Many Annas. I used to subscribe to her blog, and I’d give her posts a quick flick through. But, I’m not an RPer. I am, quite frankly, not even slightly interested in other peoples’ RP on blogs and forums. I like it in game, but more of that later. I don’t want to read fan-fiction, I don’t want to read long long blog posts tracking an individual story. I have books for that. So what do I do? I just. don’t. read. it.
As for my own RP…it doesn’t happen. Elsen, my main, seems to have developed her own personality and character over the 2 years I’ve been staring at the back of her head. My baby alts, Sapph and Petranne, have started to grow as characters. However I play on a PvE server, and anyway if I wanted to RP with Elsen she’s simply wrong from the word go cos she’s a female druid and they barely even exist ANYWAY. So that leaves me with my SAN character. A belf warlock. She has the first face, the first hair, the first eyes, that were selected. I’m not inherently evil, and if I was, I’d be rubbish at hiding it – I’ve always got Garjub, my friendly imp, out. I’d be rubbish at RPing with that too.
Now, I have no objection to other peoples RP. I find it fascinating. I would love to sit somewhere quiet and watch people genuinely immersing themselves in a proper RP world – passing plates to each other, chatting about their day, discussing whether or not Lor’themar Theron wears socks with suspenders or not.
But I would probably find it amusing, funny and have a damn good giggle if I saw some vampire RP going on. As would, let’s face it, a lot of us. If people want to get on their god damn high horses and proclaim they’ve never sniggered at a gnome and a tauren getting it on in Shattrath’s Lower City then they’re talking out of their arses.
I see a world of hypocrisy around me right now.
I see bloggers throwing abuse and nastyness at a newish blogger. I see people jumping on the bandwagon without taking the time to talk to Cranky, chat to her, see what’s happening from her point of view, first.
I see members of SAN covering their own arses before thinking of anyone else. The number of comments on Annas post from random SAN members, throwing themselves in there – “nothing to do with me, nothing to do with me! PLEASE BE AWARE THIS WAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ME, I’D LIKE TO SUCK UP SOME MORE”.
Disgraceful.
We are, as Byaghro says, a community. We are supposed to support one another. There are bloggers out there, like Too Many Annas, Matticus (although I consider that a news website, not a blog), Gevlon, these people have so many people reading them every day.
They are of a different world to the rest of us. I used to hold people of that ‘status’ almost in what I would call high regard – I used to think, “wow. How awesome must they be to have built up such a readership”. But with such a readership comes responsibility. The responsibility to think before you post. To think about what someone’s intentions were.
If you’re going to start some blogging war or to throw abuse at some poor, starting out blogger, think about it first. Don’t be like people that drive jeeps in the middle of city centres. Just because you have the biggest car it doesn’t give you the right to drive like a mother fucking lunatic and crush the tiny Fiat Pandas under your MASSIVE MOTHER FUCKING WHEELS.
I thought that those people in SAN were a community by themselves. I thought we would band together and stick together – smaller bloggers. I would have thought that those who know Cranky and know her blog and her posts and members of SAN would automatically say – “hey, Anna, hold your horses. Take your post down, rephrase it. Unquote Cranky, she’s apologised for all this completely unintentional upset, you’ve killed a blogger today, please, rethink your actions”.
However all I have seen is a load of people throwing themselves at the feet of a big blogger, making sure they are seen as not being involved.I’ve also seen the leadership of SAN covering SAN’s arses – “it’s not done by the guild, it’s not promoted by the guild, please note, it’s got nothing to do with the guild”. I have all the time in the world of Tam and Miss Medicina, I love them both as bloggers and from what I’ve seen, as people. And I understand why they would want to remove any negative connotations people have with SAN, the guild has been a nice place.
I truly hope that when they were making all the effort to remove SANs association with Cranky, they supported her too. She was – and in my mind still is – part of our community and she deserves our support.
I haven’t logged on to SAN for a few days, because I originally started my character on Argent Dawn for a bit of peace and quiet and to talk to someone I saw as a pal to chat to.
However right now I am seriously doubting my membership to SAN because this is now the second piece of drama in a week. I am also seriously doubting whether I even want to blog anymore, after this truly despicable treatment of ‘one of our own’.
Sophie.
Disclaimer – I’m speaking from my heart, not for Tam or anyone else in SAN
There’s a lot in this post I agree with. There is a power differential in the blogging world that can’t be denied – and I have a personal belief that those who have more readers have a responsibility to take more care with what they post.
I very much like Anna. I also very much like Cranky. It’s a shitty situation that happens all the time in the Blogosphere – we dont speak privately as bloggers. We post about it – publicly. That’s just what bloggers do.
I know a lot of people felt that SAN would somehow miraculously be this drama-free guild – but I never really believed that. It’s based on a community that inevitably has drama. It was only a matter of time.
Regarding Cranky, both Tam and I have spoken to her. We’ve also spoken to Anna. I’m not going to jump on people and take sides. I look for the source of the problem – and the source of the problem in this situation seems to be a lack of knowledge about what is proper behavior on an RP server.
Cranky made a post suggesting a fun event for herself and her SAN friends. It did not strike her as inappropriate for an RP server. Before she ever posted it, she asked others what they thought, and they told her it was a great idea. No one, myself included, told her that it was inappropriate. Most of us in SAN are not experienced with RP, so we really didn’t know. So she posted it – and inevitably took the blame for everyone’s ignorance about RP servers.
Seems to me that the best way to prevent a situation like this in the future is to educate EVERYONE on what is and is not appropriate on an RP server. I need the lesson too.
It was never about “covering SAN’s ass”, because we never wanted SAN to be like that. Anna asked if she should remove the link to SAN, and I told her that was entirely up to her, that I personally was not ashamed of it being SAN or anything like that. Everyone in SAN has a voice in SAN – and I’m not ridiculously worried about our “reputation as a guild”. I’d like us to be known as a friendly guild on Argent Dawn, but aside from that, I’m not too fussed about it.
I agree with you completely Miss M when it comes to drama.
It was guaranteed a load of loud mouths – which we as bloggers invariably are, getting together would result in drama and issues and bitching.
And I also said that I do not have any problem or issue with either you or Tamarind – I’ve said before I have a lot of time for you both as bloggers and people.
I think everyone does need to learn about RP, but I think there are nice ways of doing it – experimenting with each other – like I know a few low levels did on EU SAN a few weeks back in Silvermoon, I think Jae blogged about it – than being told what we HAVE to do and not do by someone who see’s themselves as a power house of the RP and blogging world.
Maybe I am being stubborn and a bit of a pillock, but I would rather learn for myself and make my own little mistakes and get laughed at by experienced RPers whilst they help me learn, than have a dictatorial set of rules put on me by an experienced RPer and blogger.
I expect it is my rather small rebellious side that comes out and says – I will learn to RP my way, and yea I might get it wrong but I will never go out of my way to upset somebody else – like Cranky never would – than have someone who thinks so much of themselves ‘bless’ me with their knowledge.
Help and assistance is one thing, having someone who thinks they are the be all and end all and that the members of SAN will all be bloody lucky to hear her precious words – is another.
If this means I don’t fit in SAN, that’s just life.
Even though Miss Medicina is speaking as an individual I think I’ll just point up there and say “what she said.”
Also I think there’s a spectrum of difference between “giggling” with your friends at the half-vampire lesbian Tauren and getting a group together to interact with said half-vampire lesbian Tauren in order to make them look stupid(er). Anna was right – it is against the ToS, and it is griefing. It’s unfortunate none of us were on the ball sufficiently at the time to recognise this.
SAN has administrators, not leaders – and as long as SAN is a happy place to be for its members I don’t care what it’s reputation is. But I don’t think any of us wants to be part of a griefing guild – and it was important to highlight this for the sake of the members.
Equally SAN was never going to be a place devoid of drama, for there is no such space. It is a place with people in it. If you feel there is no value in a community of bloggers then that’s one thing, but if you view it as some mystic platonic realm where nobody every pisses each other off or makes a mistake then … hmm … then disappointment is as inevitable as it is unreasonable.
This is not a SAN sanctioned post because there is no such thing. It is Tam. Tearing his hair out.
“Maybe I am being stubborn and a bit of a pillock, but I would rather learn for myself and make my own little mistakes and get laughed at by experienced RPers whilst they help me learn, than have a dictatorial set of rules put on me by an experienced RPer and blogger.”
I don’t think “don’t piss on people” counts as dictatorial. I think it’s a reminder of basic human courtesy.
@Soph
Well, I mean, of course you can RP anyway you so choose. I think that’s actually the point – you should feel free to make mistakes, and act stupidly as you learn… without fear of someone taking a screenshot of you and posting it on the internet as an example of someone doing bad RP.
For the record, it didn’t even occur to me that would be rude until it was pointed out. I’m another guilty party. Sometimes I don’t think about how something is fairly mean until someone explains it to me. But I don’t think that makes me a bad person – and I sure as hell don’t think it makes Cranky a bad person either.
@Tamarind
I don’t think I ever said I thought there was no value in the community of SAN – if I did I wouldn’t have been part of it in the first place.
What I find so difficult to get my head round was the ‘jump-ship’ attitude I saw of a lot of people responding to Annas original post.
I also never thought it would be devoid of drama – it was pretty much guaranteed. I started a char on Argent Dawn in the first place for a bit of peace and quiet from my home server. I think I may have underestimated the scale of such drama. To have one blogger shut down completely and another one to delete a shed load of comments on his post within a week is pretty heavy in terms of the blogosphere.
As for your second comment – what I am referencing is one of Anna’s later comments about her interacting with SAN in the future. From her first post and comments she comes across in an almost derogatory manner of not being associated with the guild/community at all, and then later seems to be looking down on us in a god-like fashion of “I will bless you all with my RP wisdom.” But hey, I am most likely misinterpreting this just as she misinterpreted Cranky in the first place.
I’m not an idiot, and would consider myself a good person and not one who would, as I said, willingly destroy other peoples immersive RP. I also however think that enough of my personality comes through on my blog to show that I would not piss on people willingly.
Thanks.
@Miss M
I think you’re right and I think a lot of us are the same in day to day life – something small and laughable to us is a big deal to others, and vice-versa.
I simply think Anna’s methodology was cruel, it was out and out cyber-bullying and just as ‘bad’ as any thought Cranky might even have had about perhaps having a little bit of a laugh at the vampire taurens.
I take issue with bullying, and that’s why I took issue with this.
Soph, I didn’t suggest that for a moment. But I didn’t read Anna’s post as “this is how you should RP lesser mortals” merely “behaving in this fashion could be construed as griefing.”
If people want to jump ship from SAN that’s entirely their prerogative – I still believe in the community, and its value, and I still, ultimately, like SAN.
I’m afraid I hadn’t read the later comments… there was a point in which I ran out of hair to tear. I just saw the post, exchanged a few emails with both Anna and Cranky. To be honest, I like both of them.
Let me just clarify this – I was responding to an interpretation of Anna’s post – NOT YOUR BEHAVIOUR. I was not suggesting you would ever do anything like that in game – or out of game. Please don’t think that for a moment.
What I was responding to was the idea that – it seems – you feel Anna’s post was handing down a dictatorial set of thou shalt nots. I read Anna’s post as pointing out that engaging with silly-RPers in a cruel fashion to mock and deride them is a form of griefing … and thus bad, m’kay.
I think we’re just talking at x-purposes.
For an articulate chap
My comments are crap
And before it gets worse
I’m turning to verse
No insult was meant
Upset not my intent
Forgive if you can
And please don’t leave SAN.
Here. Here.
I applaud people that stand up for the right, and against bullies.
Hey Soph, I think you’ve kind of posted what I’ve been thinking. I read both posts. I have both bloggers in my feeder. I don’t like to see anyone upset over what seems to have come out of a lack of knowledge or awareness or something. I am deeply upset by the whole thing. I posted on Anna’s blog and was working up to talking to Cranky (nerf work getting in the way). I can see both perspectives and feel for them both. I am very upset that cranky has taken her blog down – she was an inspiration to me. She gathered all the information I intended to on my blog but never did way quicker than I could. I love reading Anna’s stories and they have inspired me to at least think about RP. I like stalking about in Silvermoon watching others, but don’t really want to take it much further just yet. The whole thing is such a dreadful shame and I want to hug all involved, calm the hurt and somehow make it all whole again, but I doubt that is possible. Sad Seph is sad. xxx Seph
@Rivs Thank you, I appreciate your comment. I think your last word is what really brings it home to me. Cranky was not aiming to bully RPers. Bullying is a conscious thought, a maliciously intended action or sequence of actions. What Anna did? That was bullying.
@Seph Thank you for your comment Seph. I feel likewise about Cranky, I have loved her blog and her work she did on compiling resources was a massive help to lots of us. I enjoyed her writing style and her posts. I really hope she comes back, but I agree with you. I know it cuts me deep when I read something hurtful, and I really did get dreadfully upset earlier this morning – because I am at base a bit of a wimp and incredibly over-sensitive – not good qualities in a blogger. Sad Soph is also sad, but I’m pretty sure we will all recover. What I think it has brought to the forefront more than anything is I have realised that cyber bullying and cyber nastiness can hurt just as much as being told you’re fat as a teenager.
For many of us, our blogs are our babies – and to have them picked apart so nastily and without thought is painful to feel.
@Tam – cross purposes indeed. I am afraid I cannot re-read Anna’s post in a complimentary light because I still see her as having abused and bullied someone I believed to have been a friend, and to have out and out bullied someone. Her comments could have been made in many, many other ways that would not have caused this mess and this upset. She has the responsibility as a prominent blogger to think about her actions.
She said quite clearly at the beginning of her post she did not often “take on” other bloggers – implying she was doing in this case. It is clear to all I am a sensitive person, and as I just said, probably doing the wrong thing by blogging if this is the case, however I cannot stand by and let someone persecute another in that manner.
Thank you for the poem.
x
We’re so stuck on the “right” and the “wrong”.
Cranky made a mistake due to lack of knowledge about the RP community. A mistake, apparently, that many others make and that happens to hit a sensitive spot. Anna uses her post as an example to educate others.
There’s nothing wrong with Anna’s post. Just because someone is a new blogger doesn’t protect them from being quoted on other blogs or disagreed with. Anything you write is fair game and if you can’t accept that, then you shouldn’t have a public blog.
That said, I definitely empathize with Cranky. Being quoted in a negative light and being told we suck by jerk comments are things is a horrible, horrible feeling. But (and I tried to explain this to Cranky) storms blow over quickly in the internether. What is utter and total humiliation one day is completely forgotten in about two weeks.
As a community, our job isn’t to impose restrictions on other bloggers’ freedom of speech. It’s to remind our fellow bloggers that despite any criticism they might receive from readers or other bloggers, there is nothing wrong with them as a blogger or as a person. It’s our job to help them grow and keep that thick skin.
As I said on MSN, I really respect you for this post, I think it took a lot of guts to post.
I would also like to share my opinion on the matter. Starting with Cranky, who wrote a post after having a laugh in guild about some “bad” RP, she hadn’t been on an RP server before (I assume) and so didn’t really think it through properly. Fair enough. The content of the post itself, as I have read on Anna’s site, was wrong and unfair.
I compare it to eating a slice of cake (imagine the bad RPers are eating the cake), and somebody comes over and says “haha fatty, you’re eating cake and you’re fat!” Suddenly, you feel bad for eating cake, perhaps feel bad in yourself for trying to eat the cake, all the enjoyment of the cake is gone, and perhaps you don’t eat cake for quite a while after.
Even so, after Anna pointed out in her post that mocking others is griefing, which it is, Cranky took the post down. At this point, should have been left alone. She had clearly backed out of the discussion. Yet Anna left the quote in her post, claiming that it’s public property once it’s put out there. Cranky clearly didn’t want her post to be seen, she was probably ashamed of herself once she’d realised what her post entailed, yet it’s still there for anybody to see. Cranky would have left it up if this wasn’t the case.
I think Anna was unfair to leave the post up there, quoted, and the commenters on the post haven’t helped matters much either. Basically, saying that Anna has done absolutely nothing wrong. Well, honestly, the post is a good post. There are things there that needed to be pointed out. I continue to think that Anna is a good writer, a good blogger, and I like reading her blog BUT I wish she’d take down the comment, and any references to SAN or Cranky.. it feels a bit wrong, like rubbing salt in the wound almost.
I loved Cranky’s blog, she made me laugh, and she put a HECK of a lot of hard work into her blog. I really wish it hadn’t come to this when maybe, from Anna’s side, it could have been an email or a comment saying, please take this down this is actually griefing and against the TOS, Cranky takes it down, Anna does a post about griefing relating to nobody else as examples, and hey, none of this has happened. The fact that Cranky is a new blogger and Anna is a much ‘bigger’ blogger, just lead to the aftermath of the post being a lot messier…
Anna was not bullying, rude or condescending. She was assertive. While I feel bad that Cranky took down her post, and that she feels a lot of pressure, if Anna did anything malicious in her post, I’d delete all of my blogs and head off to Tibet to meditate.
@Ophelie Thanks for the comment. I think that perhaps I emphasize with Cranky due to my own sensitive nature. You’re right, there are no rights and wrongs in this situation and a lot of what I may see as wrong, others may see as right. It all comes down to personal opinion – which is what a blog is about.
@Jae – thank you. It means a lot to me that you said that. I am not abrasive by nature, or aggressive, and I am quite possibly one of life’s natural born cowards. I guess it takes a lot to tip me over the edge, and this is something I believe in.
@Bricu – I think your comment is, as my blog post was, all opinion stated as fact. In your eyes she wasn’t, in my eyes she was. I do not wish to once more go over that post with a fine tooth comb, but there were a couple of places where I (in my opinion) felt personal attacks were being made against Cranky. That is my opinion and you are welcome to yours. Thanks for your comment, and for stopping by.
I’m upset over the whole thing too. Later commenters said what I felt more eloquently than I, which is Cranky put up a post she thought was light hearted and fun (or so I assume, without talking to her), didn’t think it through (was AD her first RP server? If so, that helps explains things). Anna found it and took her to task. Now, I can agree with WHAT Anna said, but not HOW she said it or went about it. As another commenter basically said, what’s wrong with making a comment on Cranky’s blog saying “Ya know, I’m sure this seems like a funny idea, but let me explain to you the other side of things, and why this isn’t a good idea, imo”, and then going and making a post on her blog to the effect of “I saw something on a blog the other day that clued me in to the fact that some folks may be new to RP servers and don’t know the in’s and out’s of it all. This person wanted to do blah and I believe this to be wrong, here’s why…”
I’ve clocked in 5 years on RP servers, so I’ve seen alot of the arguments and forum battles on all manner of issues, but folks probably need reminding from time to time. However, Anna’s tone just came across unnecessarily harshly to me. I was a little reminded of the elitest RP’ers back in the day, running around telling folks how they’re doing it wrong. Pointing a big finger at Cranky’s blog and quoting directly from Cranky’s post and saying THIS IS AGAINST THE TOS, GODMODDING, IT’S WRONG, THIS MAY BE SAN SANCTIONED, OK, IT’S NOT! just didn’t sit well with me. We all do things that seem fun and good ideas at the time and aren’t, say things meaning it one way, but it’s taken in a way you never thought of. And that’s what I took away from Cranky’s post, when I first saw it. I wasn’t going to do any of the things she suggested…going out of my way to mock (even IC’ly) other RP’ers isn’t my thing. If something is against the ToS, I may report it. Otherwise, I’m gonna do my thing and not interfere.
If it had been me in Cranky’s place, and I’d made an ill advised post, I would hope someone either would comment on the post or sent me an email (once I get one for my blog) telling me what offended them and why, giving me the opportunity to go “Oh, I’m sorry! Didn’t think of that. Here, let me fix things”, and not go off to their blog and do exactly what Anna did. I may not have gone and deleted my blog like Cranky did, but I sure would have felt like utter crap and really hurt. Which could have been mostly avoided if someone had just told me, “Hey, you may wanna know that…”
@Endyme Firstly, thank you for commenting. Secondly, I agree with absolutely everything you have said, totally and utterly. I think you are right – an email and then a non-related blog post would have been so, so much better.
Thank you for the well thought out and eloquent comment
Elsen
I appreciate your candor and the fact that you respect my opinion regard this matter. We can differ and not turn into jerks about it.
There are others, however, who are going well beyond good taste and civil discourse.
@Bricu there are, on both sides. There are people vehemently defending Cranky in a way that makes me think they are using it purely as a chance to troll Anna – the “Anon” poster, for example. But there are also people defending Anna in a very troll-like manner too. There is fault on both sides, commenter wise.
@Endyme Thank you for putting into words what I’ve been feeling. I agree with the message Anna was trying to deliver, but I’m utterly dismayed by the manner in which she delivered it.
I hope we can look forward to a discussion about both “RP ethics” and “naming and shaming” on some of the larger blogs in the near future.
I’m actually going to be more critical than Bricu.
he appreciates your candor. he says you can both not be jerks about it.
But, you when you go onto the blog of a person that is now advocating an all out war on Anna, that is not respecting another person’s views. So you support doing something worse than even what you accuse Anna of doing. In your comment to River’s blog post you say “I’m with you completely. See my post for more.” You’re with him completely?
At the moment I am only seeing one bully and you’re standing with him.
The minute Anna took the offensive is when then the die is cast. I won’t back down until an apology is made.
@Maura Again, I agree with what you say. It’s simply the way things have been put across.
@Itanya – I presume you aren’t a reader of Rivs? If you were you would know he is opinionated, strong willed and loud. And they are all characteristics that I support in a person. If you read my post, you can see that at no point do I throw myself into out and out war. I would almost expect no less from Rivs on this situation, if that makes sense.
I have blogged about how I feel about this situation, and I have agreed with Riv in his outrage at Anna’s treatment of Cranky.
I’m not the type of person to myself go and hit back at Anna in such a way, but that doesn’t mean I cannot agree with another blogger’s motives for doing so.
The outcomes of our outrage may be different – I have blogged about it – staying civil throughout and at no point dropping down to petty comments like your last – Riv has chosen to take more direct action. Our motives, however, are the same. Disgust at the treatment of a friend by a supposedly high status blogger.
If you see only one bully here, and that bully to be Rivs, then in my opinion – as, I have said many many times today – you are looking at the wrong person.
“I presume you aren’t a reader of Rivs? If you were you would know he is opinionated, strong willed and loud. And they are all characteristics that I support in a person.”
I am opinionated, strong-willed and loud. I am glad you find these admirable qualities. In no way however, does that mean you are going to go on an all out war against someone. Even if that someone has done a friend wrong. That is neither opinionated, strong-willed or loud, that’s being a bully. And if you cannot see how threatening to stalk someone on the internet isn’t any of those three qualities, then I would question your judgement.
“If you read my post, you can see that at no point do I throw myself into out and out war. I would almost expect no less from Rivs on this situation, if that makes sense.”
I quoted what you put as your comment in your blog, Soph. You said you are with him completely. Understanding why someone is outraged is one thing, but you did not say that in your response on his blog. You said, “I’m with you completely.”
You might expect Rivs to react in such a manner, but that doesn’t mean you condone it. There have been plenty of times when I understand why a person is reacting in a certain way, but I don’t condone it.
“have blogged about how I feel about this situation, and I have agreed with Riv in his outrage at Anna’s treatment of Cranky.
I’m not the type of person to myself go and hit back at Anna in such a way, but that doesn’t mean I cannot agree with another blogger’s motives for doing so.”
So you do agree with his motives but not his methods? He is upset that his friend is hurt. I can understand being upset. I can even understand wanting to defend a friend, but acting in the manner that he is advocating… I really do not see how you could not see that as bullying. He is throwing down. He wants a fight. He wants outrage. And you are condoning it.
“The outcomes of our outrage may be different – I have blogged about it – staying civil throughout and at no point dropping down to petty comments like your last – Riv has chosen to take more direct action. Our motives, however, are the same. Disgust at the treatment of a friend by a supposedly high status blogger.
If you see only one bully here, and that bully to be Rivs, then in my opinion – as, I have said many many times today – you are looking at the wrong person.”
You do not see Rivs actions as bullying? I am not sure how you cannot? Even if I could possibly view his motives as righteous, which I obviously don’t, his actions are far from it. And you are supporting him. If you agree with his motives, why not throw your hat in with him? If what he is doing is pure, why not join with him?
Also
I swear I put spaces between those paragraphs
Ugh
I was critted by a wall of text LOL!
My blog removes the spaces for some reason, apologies for that.
I would ask as well seeing as I do not wish my post to become the despicable mess of flaming that Anna’s is if you do wish to take this further to email me.
I don’t wish for a back and forth in a comments list between two people because let’s face it it’s never going to get resolved.
Everything I post you will come back with a comment on, and vice-versa.
You have your opinion on this, and I have mine.
I’m not going to lower myself by flaming on my own blog space.
I dislike back and forths of such a manner, with you said this and I think that about every other line.
To be perfectly honest, I don’t care what Riv does to Anna. I come into contact with neither of them on a daily basis. I see what Rivs plans on doing to Anna as tit-for-tat. This is a little immature granted, but the way she treated Cranky was equally as immature.
Let them sort it out between themselves.
Riv stood up for Cranky when almost nobody else publically did. I agree with him standing up for someone who’s blog and part in the blogging community was destroyed by someone bigger and ‘more powerful’.
This is what I agree with.
This morning when I logged on, I had a reader full of blog posts and in only TWO did I see any support for Cranky.
That’s what I agree with, and that’s what I support.
As for your last comment – it is clear you don’t know my blog. If you did you would have a as clear a view and opinion of me as my readers do, and that question wouldn’t even have been asked.
I really don’t understand these claims of bullying that you and Rivs are making. Simply expressing disagreement with someone’s opinion is not bullying. Not even if done in a public forum. Not even if you have a larger audience in said forum than the person you’re disagreeing with. Not even if the other person’s feelings are hurt because you disagreed with him/her. Not even if you refuse to retract your opinion when the other person retracts theirs.
Anna’s post was just that: an expression of disagreement. She made no personal attacks. She made no call to arms, inciting others to make their own personal attacks. She made no repeat posts on the subject on her or, to my knowledge, other blogs. Expressing your opinion on your own blog is not bullying. It’s both perfectly acceptable and, frankly, the entire point of the exercise.
I’m sorry that your friend has been hurt by the backlash that her words have prompted. I hope that she recovers from it and some day feels comfortable re-opening her blog, with or without the post that sparked all this. Perhaps some of the people who visited your friend’s site were out of line in their own comments within her virtual space; I don’t know, as I never got the chance to see it before it was taken down. But to say that she has been or is still being bullied by Anna is, in my mind, both false and unreasonable.
Honestly? I think the thing that bothers me the most at this point is the “thin-skinned” argument. Yes, everyone should expect a certain amount of trolling, but to have a large portion of the RP community suddenly come down on you for 1 bad decision is another thing entirely. On top of that, the post wasn’t meant to be controversial – it’s much easier to steel yourself if you were expecting that sort of response, but we know she wasn’t.
Besides, people going into the post at this point are seeing the edited version, which is much less explicit in who it’s referencing. I noticed some of the more recent comments don’t seem to realize why people are upset about it. While I appreciate that she edited the post… sort of “too little, too late”, y’know?
SAN sounded fun to me, but I didn’t think I could roll on an RP server with no intention of RPing, and this sort of cemented my decision about it. If SAN ever makes a chapter on a normal server, I’d love to pop in and visit – I was having some doubts after reading the comments in Anna’s post, but yours makes me feel a little less alone.
Honestly, I don’t agree with what Anna did and Anna’s writing tone makes me completely nauseated. I mean, who died and made this girl the authority on RP? I hate to say it (no, I don’t) but her whole post seems like a total witch hunt against Cranky and to a lesser extent SAN.
Honestly, Anna’s post is a lot more respectful than all of the trolling that I’ve had to endure on the WOW forums. I’ve had multiple “omg Lissanna sux” threads about me on the druid forums. I get trolled hard & often, with little to no reason.
Being a public figure in the WOW community means that you are going to take some slack for being public. I mean heck, with the amount of harassment that Anna has received from her post, you would think that she would have folded up and packed out, too. However, like me, she’s so used to the harassment that she just sucks it up, locks her thread, and moves on with her life. It’s part of the package that comes with being a public figure. We just learn to live with our harassment AND realize that NONE of it is really personal.
I completely agree with you (and I also posted on Anna’s blog). Despite the explanations some gave in comments, I fail to see how writing about ‘bad’ RPers is different from writing about ‘bad’ non RPers with stupid ideas. As far as I see, if they’re chatting in /say, I can interact with them, and if I feel like being the morality police, that’s fine. I don’t think Cranky considered making *organized groups* to interfere with people’s play, like someone in Anna’s comments understood. I am sure that, if I run into some RP that strikes me as funny/dumb/ridiculous, I *will* post about it (names obscured because I feel like being nice). Does that make me an evil person who hates all RP and wants it to die? Whatever. If people actually think that, they’re too dumb to be paid attentionto. I’m not experienced with RP servers, but so far the people ‘in the know’ (both in this situation and my own experience on another server) have no made me feel very welcome.
I love SAN and I think it’s a brilliant idea (hell, I was late for work today because of gchat), but I don’t think rolling on an RP server was the best approach. Too late to do anything now, but maybe something to consider in the future.
Firstly apologies if people think I’ve been not authorising comments – I was asleep
Even comments that aren’t pleasant or whathaveyou will get authorised (unless they suddenly turn outright mean) because everyone has the right to put their opinion across.
@Verdus There are a few points in Anna’s post where I am of the opinion she is making a personal attack, and making such a personal attack when someone really didn’t deserve it is bullying. However many people disagree and however many people agree I’m just not going to change my opinion on this. At the very top of her post she states that she does not often take other bloggers on. There is point number one where I see her taking her stand, marking her territory and essentially going – “this is me and I am putting myself against this other person”. I could go on, but I’m not going to go over old ground again. Thank you for contributing, however.
@Gyugyuroon – I actually read your comments on Anna’s post and pointed them out to a friend as being the most eloquent and sensible. You have, as in those comments, hit the nail on the head. I knew when I wrote this post I would suffer some backlash from Anna’s staunch supporters, however because I expected it the little that I got (I really am a small fry in a massive pond!) was dealt with in what I think was a reasonable manner. But to have, like you said, a fair weight of the RP society basically bawling you our for a very accidental, completely misunderstood, blog post, must be terrifying. I know I would find it very upsetting because I’m not thick skinned.
And ya know, I blog because I want to blog. I don’t have a big readership, all I do is witter on about lore and locations, whathaveyou. But I like writing them and it makes my day when I get a comment!
For small bloggers like me, people like Anna, like Lissanna, like Tobold – they’re minor celebrities. When I joined SAN and there was a “Tobold”, I remember whispering Jaedia going – hey, wait, is this the REAL Tobold????
And he is one of the nicest, friendliest, soundest people I know. I remember the first time I got a comment from Kae @ Dreambound I had a proper, hyperventilating, little girl moment of, “omgomgomg!!”.
Anna talks about not being griefed in her bad RP by uber-RPers, and that’s why she RPs today.
What about being griefed by ‘uber’ bloggers? That’s what happened, and it destroyed a wonderful blog and deeply upset a wonderful blogger.
@Zan well done for summing my post up in three lines
I think that, with her edits, she left SAN alone, but her original unedited post – which the majority of commenters haven’t actually seen, they cry out at us supporting cranky saying we’re making a fuss over nothing, when only a few saw her original multiples links, trackbacks and finger pointing at Cranky and SAN. In my honest opinion it comes back to one main point. The larger your readership, the more responsible you are for your posting. Anna isn’t stupid, and from reading her comments on her own post she has realised what a silly mistake she made by essentially trying to make an example of someone and naming and shaming someone who had done nothing malicious or intentionally wrong. I think many people have agreed by now that there were many, many ways she could have approached the subject better and someone with her blogging experience should just have thought things through. It’s a shame her apparent stubbornness is stopping her from removing the quote.
@Lissanna Thank you for your comment. I think what you say is right on some levels, Anna is a public figure. You are. Nobody deserves trolling in that base sense of the word – omg so and so sux, etc etc. But that isn’t what this was. It wasn’t basic idiots trolling, it was one very high-status public figure choosing someone of a much lower blogging ring, if that makes any sense, linking to her, making an example of her, and pointing her out. And my post in return isn’t trolling. At no point do I say “omg Anna sux” or that I dislike her RP in particular. I’m putting my points across as eloquently as I can do. You and Anna, long term bloggers – you have learnt to live with getting harrassed. But surely this isn’t the way to induct newish bloggers into the community – by giving them such a baptism of fire – “this is what it will be like, suck it up and get used to it”.
@Jen You are very right. I actually played around a little with the RP in Silvermoon last night. I watched in slight amazement as a Tauren in a pirate suit (called Legolos, in fact), RPed shouting for some PEACON PIE at an undead bartender. It made me laugh. Yes! I said it! I LAUGHED AT BAD RP! But does this make me a terrible person? No. I think that we do have a lot to learn about RP. I certainly do, and my eyes and mind are open to learning about it. But I want to learn about it my way – I’ll watch it, experience it, read up on it. But one place I won’t be going, and one person I won’t be listening to? Anna. Her attitude towards us “noobs” has really, really put me off.
On my first day on Defias, a human was telling a draenei that “he knows she only wants to learn of their perverted ways”. Nothing graphic, but the bits of conversation I caught were fairly… suggestive. I wouldn’t troll (mainly because I don’t want to RP in any way), but I definitely told my friends and rofled about it. I was planning to make a post about this (being a noob on RP servers, the good and bad), but I don’t have enough material yet because I’m mostly been in dungeons. If and when I do get enough stories/screenshots, you bet I’ll post about it. My blog is about my experiences in the game, and this is a part of that, no matter what RP “defenders” think about it.
(Don’t worry about approving comments – I’m used to writing on American blogs and waiting until evening until the comments appear
)
@Jen that just made me do a mini-lol (a nose snort, essentially) at work.
I got chocolate sponge everywhere.
It’s punishment for laughing at RPers.
As one of these bloggers who is probably being roundly ‘cussed out’ for not sticking up for a guildie, I thought it would be a good idea to offer my perspective.
I post, comment, and write, first and foremost, as myself. I don’t represent any other person or group. Sure, I’ve copped flak for this in the past. It doesn’t generally bother me after a few hours (or drinks, whichever comes first). What can I say, I’m a tough cookie!
So, when I read Anna’s post, I said what I thought. I thought Cranky’s post was unfortunate. I also said that I thought it was probably poorly thought out and discussed, and that, had either of those things happened, it probably wouldn’t have happened. We’ve all posted rashly in the past, myself especially included.
I ALSO said that I wished this could have been dealt with in some other manner first. I didn’t think it was fair to call someone out quite so publicly, especially a comparatively new blogger and RPer. I felt awful for everyone involved on many levels. The whole event has turned out very unfortunately.
And, I’m sorry, but I wasn’t going to claim knowledge of an event I knew nothing about. Covering my ass? Sure. But I’ve had to drag my own ass out of the fire (without anyone standing up for me) enough times that I just don’t feel like doing it unless it’s necessary. Sure, it’s JUST a game and JUST a blog. However, it’s also two years of my life, and I value that as well.
@Saresa to be honest, it wasn’t aimed at yourself at all in particular. That particular aspect of Anna’s comments was more aimed at those who jumped straight on the ol’bandwagon so to speak, and did a straight out “nothing to do with me, I smite Cranky with my comment on Anna’s post” attitude. It wasn’t aimed at those who had the sense to look on the whole thing objectively and see that there was a) nothing malicious behind Cranky’s post and b) that there were many other ways Anna could have dealt with the situation that would have been far better.
As an aside, none of us SAN members knew about it as a SAN event, because it wasn’t one. This was a direct misinterpretation of Cranky’s post in the first place.
Thank you for your comment – I’ve been a long-time reader and lurker of your own very very cool site.
I’m really hesitant to add much to this discussion. I’m neither a member of SAN, nor do I RP.
However, I do blog and I’m a so-so member of the BA community.. I guess that gives me a marginal stake in the game.
So, not saying too much here but hopefully enough to get people thinking.
How many people truly responded only reading Anna’s post? How many really read the original post?
And if you did? Did you read it through the a biased lense?
After you answer this.. Now ask yourself…
How does everyone’s response measure up to the post? Did it truly do it’s job and help the community? Was the original post so bad, so awful that it truly harmed the RP Community?
Was Anna’s post really that bad? Did Anna just overreact? Or act just enough and it was the community that grabbed all the pitchforks and torches?
I deal with my own share of trolls. Self inflicted or otherwise. But I’ve been a netizen for.. well, since the beginning. (Literally, Usenet with Base64 and Gopher anyone?) And there has always been trolls. There will always be trolls.
So ask yourself these questions and then give it some serious thought. Is the cost truly worth it.
Hi Elsen – kudos for sticking up for your friend. I trust you’re not going to leave SAN?
I think its a silly situation all in all. We’re bloggers and I found it hilarious that within 2 weeks we’d had this much drama although perhaps not unexpected. A couple misunderstandings and look how many column inches have been generated. I did actually want to post on Anna’s comments but by that time it had been locked. I was at least glad there were some people like Gyugyuroon standing up and saying “Hang on a minute, yes she insulted your baby but inadvertantly calling in the heavies was probably a bit of a dick move”
@Brigwyn – A reasonable and well thought out comment. Where was this when you were “vehemently” defending BM raid viability in Frostheim’s posts a while back? :p
Just kidding, I completely agree though. I read Anna’s post and I was pissed off. Not because I felt SAN were ditching one of their own (which after 2 weeks is a slightly silly concept) but because I felt Anna should and could have done things better. The other thing incidentally about guild loyalty is that SAN the guild is actually 2 guilds connected by a forum, based on EU and US servers – I’d say some of those people didn’t even know CH because they don’t play with her, but RP and read Anna’s and so reacted negatively.
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